Just got back from a real estate video and photo shoot in Breckenridge Colorado. My client wanted me to some how express that their condo was a very short walk to the ski lift.

Instead of doing a video of the lift with some text that describes that I remembered Griffin over at Indy Mogul demo’ing a travel time lapse, so I Google that and found Hyper Time Lapse instead. I think travel time lapse describes this better so that is why I am titling this video as such.

Basically I did what Griffin did but I did it much faster because I didn’t know if it would work, so I put my ND filter on the Canon 16mm-35mm lens I am reviewing, set the camera to manual with about 1/4 sec shutter and took one picture and then moved about 2 feet towards the ski lift.

I throw the raw pictures in to After Effects and this is what I got. Not usable but I could see potential, then I added warp stabilizer at 2% and some CC motion blur and this is what I got, much better.

Then I cranked up the warp stabilizer about as far as it would go before it would complain with a dimension message at 35%, and this is what I got. Not too bad for doing this quickly. Now I am not sure if I will use this because there is no snow on the ground and it is not that pretty to look at, but perhaps I will toss it in the assembly cut to show it to the client to see what they think.

This morning I got up early and tried it again this time I tried to keep the lens a lot more even so warp stabilizer didn’t have to work so hard. Unfortunately my 5D3 as close to 10,000 shots and started over at 1 during the time lapse so I didn’t want to renumber half of them so I ran it and this one came out not so good anyway at 35%, I am sure if I lowered it, it might have worked better.

12 Comments

Can I suggest putting your camera on the handheld stabiliser gimbal you have, video yourself walking the 200 metre journey, then stabilise the video in post with Warp Stabiliser, and then speed up the footage by ten times.

You have to work very precisely to make it as smooth as possible. Only a discrepancy of 2 inch can lead to high distortion.

Michael

Posted August 21, 2013 at 3:51 PM

Just throwing this out there but have you thought about using skate board or roller skating through your scene.
I don’t want you to get hurt but it seems like it would save alot of time in post and give you the gliding effect.
Love the videos.
Michael

Another great job. As a viewer though, I am not sure this tells the story of what the owner wants ( walking distance to the lift) Here is why – it needs a person walking. As it is right now I notice the buildings more than the path. I think putting a person or group with skis would give it scale and tell the story better. Perhaps they have ski gear in their hands and then when you get to the last fence the camera stops and we see them walking the rest of the way to the lift. – Then it is implied that is where they were going. Just a thought. CAN NOT wait for the Mark 3 tutorial – How much longer on that one? I will buy it day one!!!

@Shawn thanks! Actually I do have some footage of someone walking with their skis to the lift from another video but I can’t use it, but I like your idea. This time lapse did not make it in the the video I am currently working on.

I will be starting on the 5D3 course very soon!

Aaron

Posted August 23, 2013 at 9:56 AM

Hey Dave, thanks for all your hard work! Just a suggestion for your file number reset challenges – there are free, easy to use programs that can rename batches of files in a couple seconds that will make it so AE can see them properly. I ran into this problem on a Mac which was an easy fix with the Automator utility that comes with OSX. However, I do recall finding a free program on my old Windows machine 5+ years ago that basically did the same thing. Sorry I can’t remember the name of the program I used to use but this one seems like a good one to try out.(no spam or sales stuff as far as I can tell) http://www.bulkrenameutility.co.uk/Main_Intro.php

Anyway, I hope that helps! Happy time-lapsing!

John

Posted August 24, 2013 at 2:53 PM

Hey Dave,
Is there a reason why you didn’t get the Canon 17-40mm f/4L?
It’s much more affordable while offering about the same zoom range.

Since you aren’t shooting wide open, there shouldn’t be a difference, right?